CONSERVATISM FROM A FEMININE POINT OF VIEW

Where Do You Stand?

The first time that I ever voted, I split my ticket. It was a presidential election year and I voted for the Republican candidate for President. After that, I’ve always voted straight Republican. As you can determine, I have never voted for a Democrat for President or for Governor of Alabama. I became a very outspoken Republican in the 1980s after joining Greater Birmingham Young Republicans.

I truly believe in the Republican philosophy of how we should govern ourselves; less government is best and if the government needs to handle something, it should be done at the lowest level of government possible.

Having said the above, there have been countless times that folks have said to me, “I don’t vote for the party, I vote for the person.” I have more respect for someone who is a big government/socialist/totalitarian leaning Democrat than I have for the person who claims to be independent and “votes for the man.” I include those that “vote for the man” as low information voters and pretty much hold them responsible for the dire situation that this country is in now.

In 2008, they didn’t like President Bush and just because it happened on Bush’s watch, the late summer/early fall collapse of the economy was automatically George Bush’s fault. This country needs change and anything has to be better than what we have. So, without doing any research on the root cause of the 2008 economic collapse, they voted for the sliver-tongued Barak Obama (now I’ve actually said his name) because he promised hope and change.

A low information voter usually gets his or her news from a local newspaper and the evening news. Because the mainstream media is an advocate of liberal causes, low information voters tend to accept, without a doubt, that man-made global warming/climate change is real, that those who reject socialized medicine/Obamacare are racists and don’t want the American people to have access to health care, that Republicans/conservatives are against the current President because he is half black, etc.

In 1992, the year that Bill Clinton was elected President for the first time, I was working with a number of very opinionated women. If you recall, one of the platforms that the Clinton campaign rallied around was the acumen of Bill’s wife, Hillary. They purported that in voting for Bill, you would get two for the price of one. Hillary Clinton was definitely going to be an involved first lady. Several of the women that I worked with were very supportive of Hillary and were excited that a woman, it didn’t matter that she was not actually elected by the people or appointed to a position with the approval of Congress, was going to be heavily involved in the governing of this nation. When I simply told them that I didn’t agree with her politically, they looked at me as though I was a traitor to my sex. It seems that nothing mattered about her except that she was a woman and a self-proclaimed feminist. This group was definitely pro-choice, but on other issues I doubt any of them could discuss much of anything.

Several months ago I recall seeing a post from someone on Facebook to the effect that we should forget about being a Democrat or a Republican and work together to solve our problems. That certainly sounds good, but so many times, we get those “watered down” solutions that no one is happy with. Furthermore, those solutions are usually bad. Republicans seems to be scared to be portrayed in the press as the party of “NO.” Therefore, they end up compromising and government just gets larger.

With a government so unfathomably huge and an administration that is out of control, I think the Republicans should embrace being the party of “NO.” NO to expanding the role of government. NO to more social programs that are making our citizens even more dependent on government than they already are.NO to new taxes. NO to violating the principles set forth in the U.S. Constitution by our founding fathers.

Being an “Internet Girl,” I spend a substantial amount of time online, a lot of it doing political research. While I mostly peruse conservative sites, I also spend some time on liberal sites such as Huffington Post, Mother Jones, Salon, and Slate. I don’t like seeing things taken out of context and will call out anyone, Democrat or Republican on that.

Now I don’t expect everyone to take an interest in political issues like I do, but I do think it is every American citizen’s duty to be an informed voter. When you voted for the silver-tongued president that promised hope and change, did you do any research regarding what that change might include or did you just go with the mainstream media who were slobbering all over themselves at the site of this guy. Do you know what the difference between a Republican and Democrat is, what the difference between a conservative and a liberal is? Before even getting in close proximity to a voting place, I believe that knowing these differences is an absolute necessity.

As I indicated above, it’s not just the big government liberals that are taking this country down. In fact, the root blame for the descent of this country lies with the low information voters and those who “vote for the man.”